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We are Alyssa and Bri, two sisters who believe God wants more for women than we've been taught. Join us as we dive into the intersection of faith and feminism, learning together as we go.
To the We Are More Pod cast. My name is Alyssa. And my
Speaker 2:name is Bree. We're two sisters passionate about all things faith and feminism. We believe
Speaker 1:that Jesus trusted, respected, and encouraged women to teach and preach his word. And apparently, that's controversial. Get comfy.
Speaker 2:Guess who's back? Back again. We're back. Tell a friend.
Speaker 1:Is that the first time we've opened an episode like that?
Speaker 2:No. It can't be.
Speaker 1:I feel like you've definitely started an episode like that.
Speaker 2:I can't stop, and I won't stop. I refuse to stop. With that particular song? Yep.
Speaker 1:Well, good. At least we know where your priorities are.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. My priority has always been Eminem. Obviously.
Speaker 1:You know, I've I've heard that from many people.
Speaker 2:Honestly, a day does not go by without me quoting Eminem.
Speaker 1:For the, what, two songs that you actually know?
Speaker 2:A true Michigander through and through Yes. As our governor would say.
Speaker 1:Does our governor say that?
Speaker 2:No. She just always says, Michiganders. To all my Michiganders.
Speaker 1:The people that aren't from Michigan have no idea what we're talking about.
Speaker 2:We're from Michigan. That's located in The United States. It looks like a hand. And then we stole a little bit of Wisconsin. I'm not clear on the history, but we call that our Upper Peninsula.
Speaker 1:And we do this particularly weird thing when someone asks where we're from or where we're going. We hold our hand out like a mitten, and we point.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We're like, around, you know, thumb area.
Speaker 1:I didn't realize that was weird until I, like, traveled somewhere one time, and I was showing someone my hand, and they were like, oh my gosh. You guys really do that.
Speaker 2:I think there's technically other states that you could do that with. Like, if you think Florida, you just flip your hand upside down. Now you have the panhandle as your thumb, and the rest of your hand is Florida.
Speaker 1:You hear that, Floridians? Whole new world for you. A whole
Speaker 2:new world. You can locate things with your hand. And that's what palm reading is. I'm just joking.
Speaker 1:I feel like Maine, you could probably, like, you know, just hold your hand flat.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Together. And then California, it's just two hands.
Speaker 1:Right? Yeah. But what do you
Speaker 2:point with then? Your tongue. Obviously, tongue. Obviously. Or your nose.
Speaker 2:The nose probably would be better.
Speaker 1:Or you just gesture, like a little bit
Speaker 2:of a chin notch Sure. Like a over there.
Speaker 1:Well, now you know. Are you happy to know all this information?
Speaker 2:Would you like us to talk about other states that you can use your hands with? And then in next week's episode, we can move on to countries. Hey. Riveting content. Speaking of countries, we're in 29 countries now.
Speaker 2:Can we talk about that?
Speaker 1:We can. I'm super excited. So we get some data from our
Speaker 2:I don't know. Posting software?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Whatever you wanna call it. And they let us know kind of just the general area, like, country that people are listening from. And, yeah, this week we hit 29 countries. We're in every continent other than Antarctica in the world.
Speaker 2:Why not? Penguins. This is a direct message to you. Start listening. But isn't
Speaker 1:that cool? Like, six out of seven continents, people are listening to us.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:That's pretty amazing. That's very cool.
Speaker 2:I texted Alyssa when she told me that. I said, we're almost 30, flirty, and thriving. So if anybody could get, you know, one more country. Luxembourg.
Speaker 1:Luxembourg. If you have any friends in Luxembourg didn't we used to do that at the end of a lot
Speaker 2:of Yeah. We actually were having a big debate today whether Alyssa was too pretentious or not. And my answer is yes. Because I'm like, Luxembourg. And she's like, Luxembourg?
Speaker 1:Alright, people. If you know anyone from Luxembourg, ask them how they say the name of their country.
Speaker 2:Google it right now. Google no. Ask chat GPT how pretentious people say.
Speaker 1:Hold on. I'm gonna have Google play it.
Speaker 2:I can hear your fingernails. Know. Have be tapping it. Alright. Ready?
Speaker 2:Luxembourg. Alright. No. That was anticlimactic justification.
Speaker 1:But it has an O U R G.
Speaker 2:Okay. Think about the French language and how many letters they just throw in there willy nilly. But this is in English. It doesn't matter. You're pretentious and wrong.
Speaker 1:I will admit to being wrong.
Speaker 2:I'm probably pretentious. That
Speaker 1:was one of the sadder moments of my life.
Speaker 2:You even pulled up the phone. I didn't pull up the phone. You pulled out the phone. My gosh.
Speaker 1:I'm glad you all were there for that moment.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna be thinking about this for a while.
Speaker 1:She's gonna tell everyone we know.
Speaker 2:And now we can go on to other things that you pronounce on Let's
Speaker 1:get to our actual content.
Speaker 2:Costco. Okay. Costco has a t. And Luxembourg has a u. But Costco has a t.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Okay. How do you guys
Speaker 1:say the ice cream that is made from fruits? Not sorbet, the other one. Think think on that for a moment. Because I say sherbet because that's how it's spelled.
Speaker 2:And as any good American, I say sherbert. Well, I'm not a very
Speaker 1:good American. So there you go.
Speaker 2:Anyway. So on to today's content. Speaking of being a not good American. No. Wait.
Speaker 2:She's good. We're talking
Speaker 1:about good we're starting with good. We're starting with good, but globally good.
Speaker 2:Globally good.
Speaker 1:Which is maybe not American good.
Speaker 2:I was thinking in the bathroom. I I'm not As you do. Currently, I'm not thinking before I'm speaking, so this story may go absolutely nowhere. Cool. Cool.
Speaker 2:But I was thinking about how anti Christian America is. Oh, good. Let's let's really piss people I was just chilling in the bathroom, and I was like, America is all about pull yourself up by your boot straps and get things done and take care of your people, like yourself and whatever. Mhmm. I'm like, how un Christian is that?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Think about what Jesus did. Think about him feeding the, oh, how many was it? 10,000? I don't know.
Speaker 2:He was constantly feeding people.
Speaker 1:5,000 and then 7,000.
Speaker 2:Washing other people's feet who would be considered below him. Think about how he lived his life. How un American that is.
Speaker 1:And the church is called to live life in community. Like, truly deeply in community where Mhmm. You are just doing for other people all the time. Even people that are not in your tiny little sphere
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:But your broader community to do everything you can possibly do for them. Whereas we are very hyper independent here.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's like, pull yourself up by your bootstraps. But how much further could you go if you didn't have to pull yourself up? What if you could reach out a hand? Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And someone else could help you up? How much further could you go? Mhmm. That was my thought in the bathroom. Random bathroom thoughts with Brie.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I have really deep thoughts. Specifically in the bathroom? Yeah.
Speaker 1:Feel like we've we've done a shower thoughts with Brie segment before.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Have some really weird I was listening to Amy Poehler's podcast today, and she was interviewing, I think her name's Natasha Lyonne. She's a actress. She was in like Russian Doll and Orange is the New Black. But just listening to the way she was speaking, she's really interested in quantum physics.
Speaker 2:Woah. You guys should listen to that episode. It blew my mind. Just a side note.
Speaker 1:I am not interested in quantum physics.
Speaker 2:Neither am I. Not my vibe. No. She's like, why are things the way they are? But also at the same time, nothing matters.
Speaker 1:But for people that think things do matter. Speaking of speaking Wait. Butterfly in the sky. So today, we're once we finally get ourselves on track, we're gonna be talking about some current events, some inspirational women. Just kind of having a nice little chat this week.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Just chatting it up based on what I saw scrolling through TikTok. So I thought we could break up this podcast into three different segments. So I can do the sound again? Exactly.
Speaker 2:Huzzah. So the first one, just like women to celebrate. I think it's important to speak about the women that are out here in the world doing good, making changes, making movement. Because we hear about, you know, ye olde gentlemen all the time. It's time to celebrate some I'm lie, olde gentlemen.
Speaker 2:Ladies. And just some different female experiences out there in the world today. You know, good, bad, ugly, and some little microfeminist movements. Because I had made a TikTok post the other day, the other day meaning like a month ago. It was like, share some microfeminist movements or acts of microfeminism that you practice in your day to day life, just because I was interested.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And so some people commented, we can share that. I love it. Alright.
Speaker 1:Tell me about some inspirational women, Breon, to hear about it.
Speaker 2:Here's to the ladies. Mackenzie Scott. Now, I don't know if you've heard of her, but I'm gonna tell you a little bit about her. She's a businesswoman. She's a philanthropist, and she's a novelist.
Speaker 2:She's published two books. One was award winning. It was The Testing of Luther Albright. I don't know what it's about. Don't ask me further questions.
Speaker 1:And the
Speaker 2:other book is called Traps.
Speaker 1:It's such a long title, and then just Traps. Traps.
Speaker 2:I don't know one single solitary iota about either of these books, but she is a novelist. She is the third wealthiest woman in The United States right now. She's one of Forbes world's 100 most powerful women in 2021, and in 2023, she was on Times 100 most influential people. Does anybody know who she is yet?
Speaker 1:Well, I do, but that's not fair.
Speaker 2:I was speaking to the people Alright. In the 29 countries. The you.
Speaker 1:Do you know?
Speaker 2:Do you know? Without me saying this next bit of information. She was married to Jeff Bezos from 1993 to 2019. That's a good amount of time.
Speaker 1:That is. Now, if you don't know who he is, he was the well, is the founder of Amazon.
Speaker 2:Amazon. Amazon. Everybody's getting stuff from Amazon.
Speaker 1:I tell you, four Amazon trucks come to my house a day.
Speaker 2:I know. I think I overnighted something to myself last night. You think, hey, bitch, where is it? Anyways. So Mackenzie Scott, they got married in 1993.
Speaker 2:She helped found Amazon Mhmm. Along with Jeff. And when they got married, did not have a prenup. Which is kind of big for someone of, you know, that amount of wealth now to not have some kind of prenup, but they didn't. And as things do, it didn't work out because guess why?
Speaker 2:He was cheating on her. Shocking. Shock. Shock of a lifetime. And because they didn't have a prenup, she was entitled to 50% of his assets.
Speaker 2:But she was like, no, no, no, no, no, no. Guess what? I want Amazon shares. Which was the move. Because that set her up for life.
Speaker 2:That set her kids up for life to be billionaires.
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And I know that word gets thrown around a lot lately, but really think about that. I was watching a TikTok the other day about someone's wedding. It it may have been Jeff Bezos' wedding. I don't and it was like 500 something million. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And they're like, think about that. Okay. The average American household, say they make 150,000 a year. If you do the math and like compare how much 500,000,000 is to Jeff Bezos or whoever it was, some billionaire, to the average household, it's like $52.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:So that would be like a normal everyday person spending $52 On their whole wedding. On their whole wedding.
Speaker 1:And they were like, tax the rich.
Speaker 2:Tax the rich. This is ridiculous. Well, I'm
Speaker 1:reading because obviously we hear billionaire all the time. Mhmm. And to have a million dollars is a big deal. But here's I'm on Reddit right now. And it says, how much is a billion compared to a million?
Speaker 1:One million seconds is about twelve days. One billion seconds is about thirty two years. One million minutes ago was approximately two years ago. One billion minutes ago was the year one fourteen AD. Like, that's the difference.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. So, yeah. To think that she set herself and all of her children up as billionaires. That's beyond my concept
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Of anything.
Speaker 2:It's insane. Mhmm. It's like, you can't even fathom that amount of money to a normal person who is like, oh, I'm going into Target. Oh, crap. I accidentally spent a $100.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. That's that's however many hours that I just worked. That's that's a significant amount of money. Mhmm. Whereas, like, these billionaires poop on a $100.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. That's I can't this is insane. This is insanity. Anyways, back to Mackenzie. So she is a billionaire, but has agreed to donate a majority, so over 50% of her income, her wealth, to charitable organizations.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And that was something called the Giving Pledge, which was founded by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. Mhmm. I wanna say buffet. That's not it.
Speaker 2:Buffett. Which encourages wealthy people to contribute a majority or more than 50% of their wealth to philanthropic causes. Mhmm. And so she was like, yep, I'm in it. So in 2020, she donated $5,800,000,000 to charitable causes.
Speaker 2:2021, she donated 2,700,000,000.0. And as of mid December twenty twenty four, she's donated $19,300,000,000.
Speaker 1:In total?
Speaker 2:In I don't even know. It's just a lot. So her charities that she's choosing, it's like a wide variety. It's like 1,600 different charitable organizations at this point. But a lot of them deal with gender equity, racial justice, reproductive rights, and the arts.
Speaker 2:I love that
Speaker 1:she threw that one in there. Yeah.
Speaker 2:The arts. The arts. Yep. And she's donated more than Jeff Bezos ever did. Uh-oh.
Speaker 2:She's one of the leading donors out there in the world. In
Speaker 1:the world. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And she's still a billionaire. Mhmm. She's still raking in the dough. And you think about that, and you're like, how much good could be out there in the world? How many problems could be solved?
Speaker 2:Think about your neighbors that, you know, are struggling to pay rent. Think about the people who are struggling to put food on the table. And there are billionaires out there who think they shouldn't be taxed.
Speaker 1:Well, the thought that she can have she can have given away $19,000,000,000. I mean, I I don't know how many seconds 19,000,000,000 equates to. But it's a bunch. And and still, like, she's still doing great. No one has asked her to give away so much that she's on the streets.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. But she's looking at her wealth and saying, I don't need this. I don't require this much in my life. I couldn't spend this much in 50 lifetimes.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. I sure could.
Speaker 1:And to say someone else matters more than me. Mhmm. So I'm going to take this and and feed someone who's hungry and clothe someone who is cold, whatever this money is doing to provide for other people.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Amazing amazing women.
Speaker 1:And one of the things Brie and I talked about, you know, is I think based on some of the coverage that I've seen about her, I've heard a lot of people say things like, well, you know, she's just spending his money. They got divorced and she's just spending
Speaker 2:his money. Oh, I got you. Elon Musk. Mhmm. Our our friend Elon Musk.
Speaker 1:Well, don't say that.
Speaker 2:Our local enemy, Elon Musk. Took to Twitter and said It's not Twitter. He ruined that for us all. I'm still saying Twitter. Okay.
Speaker 2:Because ex is stupid. It is stupid. He tweeted and said, super rich ex wives who hate their former spouses should be filed among no. He specifically said, should filed be listed among. But I don't think that's what he Super rich ex wives who hate their former spouses should be listed among reasons that Western civilization died.
Speaker 2:Genius. Imagine sitting on your, I don't
Speaker 1:know, plutonium throne and looking at someone doing this level of good in the world and saying, you suck.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Well, I think he's lashing out because she's a threat to him in some ways. Mhmm. Because he has so much, and she has so much, but she's doing so much good Mhmm. With her muchness.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And he is just continuing to take Mhmm. As much as he can from this world and the people in it. Right. He is famously against DEI.
Speaker 2:He tweeted, DEI is just another word for racism. Shame on anyone who uses it. That's so easy to say from your white male privilege. Right. Think about someone else.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. It's ridiculous. This is a weird world that
Speaker 1:we're living in. I think it's really we give people an excuse when they come from that level of privilege. Like, just just being a white male in the world that we live in Mhmm. Gives you a level of privilege. And so she comes from this space of being a woman.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And automatically starting the race 10 steps backwards.
Speaker 2:Well, just because she's a woman, people look at her and be like, oh, she's just spending her husband's money.
Speaker 1:Yes. Exactly. She built Amazon right alongside him. Yeah. And yet we we don't give her credit for that.
Speaker 1:We don't give her credit for all the years that she Sacrificed. Sacrificed and spent figuring this out alongside him. And then to be tossed aside again.
Speaker 2:And she's done so many other amazing things. In 2014, she founded something called the Bystander Revolution, which is an anti bullying organization. Can you imagine Jeff doing that? No. He likes to bully.
Speaker 2:I mean, you're not wrong. Could we get sued for this?
Speaker 1:Probably for many of the things that we've People
Speaker 2:like when we're a little bit haters. Angry? Yeah. One of our number one episodes is that one where we absolutely spit all over that book.
Speaker 1:It is our number one listened to episode of all time is where we talked about Danae Dobson's book,
Speaker 2:Let's Talk Girlfriends, Guys, Growing Up. Yeah. Like
Speaker 1:that. We ripped that to shreds. But people loved it. I tell you.
Speaker 2:If Kendrick Lamar can do it, we can too. Made a career off of just hating.
Speaker 1:He did. He made a he that is all he does. But you know what? Respect. Respect.
Speaker 2:So who else are we talking about? Okay. Listen. I googled how to say her name. And I need everybody with me to not judge me because I can't say her name correctly, even though I googled it.
Speaker 2:Her name is Nirmala Sittaraman. I think that was pretty close. Good for me.
Speaker 1:To what Google pronounced it as.
Speaker 2:She was one of Forbes 2024 most influential women. She is India's minister of finance and minister of corporate affairs as of May 2019. And she's the first full time female minister to hold both of these positions at the same time. Now, basically, what she is doing is she's in charge of finance for India, which is nearly like $4,000,000,000,000. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Think about that. If we're talking about billions, now we're talking about trillions. Right. That is a crap ton of money. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And India has the fifth largest GDP in the world. They're actually currently the fourth. Oh, look at her go. With $4,190,000,000,000
Speaker 2:Mhmm. She projects that India will soon overtake Japan and Germany, becoming the third largest in the world by 2027.
Speaker 1:Good news. They already overtook Japan. Good news.
Speaker 2:She's not dead.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:Welcome. She's been outspoken about being in favor of women's economic empowerment in India, encouraging entrepreneurship, business lending, and financial education for her country's female population. And I just think that's super inspirational. She's a lady boss out there. I hate the term lady boss.
Speaker 2:I hate that I just said that. But really encouraging, like, literacy for women. Right. Not just in The US. It's interesting to see that this is happening in other countries.
Speaker 2:Think about all of the people in India. There are a lot of people in India. And how empowering that is to see a woman in that role Mhmm. Handling India's finances. And they're doing great.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Well, we talked about at the beginning of the episode how The United States we like to think of ourselves as like an island.
Speaker 2:We're number one. Yeah. We're number one.
Speaker 1:And so it's easy for us from here to think, like, we are the only people striving for feminist equality, things like that. And yet when we look at the broader picture, we look at the broader world Mhmm. Places like India, places like Sweden who has a large portion of their government. Iceland. Is women.
Speaker 1:Yes. Iceland. And they're doing so much better oftentimes than we are. And to see it is so cool to see that inspiration. And I think of what that does for young girls in those spaces.
Speaker 1:To be able to look up to these women and say like, that's what I want. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Well, just seeing women occupying those spaces that for so long we only see men handling. It's just different. Mhmm. Think about the Barbie movie. If anybody's ever seen the Barbie movie when None of them have seen it.
Speaker 2:Listen, go and watch It's really good. It made me cry multiple times. But there's like Barbie Land, and it's all of the positions in power, all of the important roles are held by women. So the president, all of the doctors, all of the astronauts, all of the whatever are women. And then there's the Kens, who their job is the beach.
Speaker 2:Not surfing, not lifeguard, just the beach. And then they go into the real world, and Ken starts to see all of those important roles that he was seeing in Barbie Land held by men. Mhmm. And he's like, wow, I gotta bring this back to Barbie land. Think about that in our life.
Speaker 2:We are living in the real world. Mhmm. All of the important roles are held by men right now. But what happens to girls when they see women in those spaces? They start to think, I can do that too.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:I think the really important thing to learn from all of that is not that, like, oh, only women should
Speaker 2:be in Mhmm.
Speaker 1:But to say, we're gonna add diverse voices
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Into the mix. Because the only way really to move forward is to see things from other people's perspectives, to see what's not working. Because if you're if all the voices are basically the same Mhmm. You know, you've got a bunch of white men in power and it's it's an echo chamber. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:It's all one voice coming at you. So then if you add those extra voices and you say, okay, what do you see that's going on that's wrong? Because I don't see it because it doesn't impact me.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. So
Speaker 1:what do you and I could say that for myself in my own life. You know, I only see things from where I'm sitting. So I need someone else to come along and say, well, I struggle with this. Mhmm. You don't see it because it doesn't impact you.
Speaker 1:And so when we add women's voices into the government, when we add women's voices into finance, into philanthropy, into business, into all of these spaces where historically we have been kept out of. Now there's a new perspective there. Now things can change in a positive light so that everyone can feel equal. So that everyone's voice can be heard. And that's what I think we see with both of these women.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Opening those doors to hopefully a better next generation. Hopefully. Hopefully. As long as we raise them well.
Speaker 2:Here's hoping. Those are all the the powerful ladies that I have. There are so many. There are so many. We could make this like a regular segment.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Non biblical women, I say. But another thing that I wanted to talk about was just little things going on in the world today. Should I start? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Go ahead. You're looking weird. I couldn't think of a transition. Just like female experiences. Right?
Speaker 2:What's going on in the world today? It's good to stay, you know, up to date, yada yada yada.
Speaker 1:What's impacting us out in the world?
Speaker 2:What's impacting you? So the first thing that I want to talk about was something I saw on TikTok. In Iraq, they came up with a female only transportation agency. There's a I think there's a couple different companies doing this, but it's specifically, like, driven by women for women because they notice their people saying they don't feel safe. Using public transportation or using like, you know, those rideshare apps.
Speaker 2:So they came up with female only. Driven by women, for women. And I just think that's really cool to hear about because it gives women a whole another opportunity that they didn't have possibly before. Women can go get different jobs. They can go do different chores in their household.
Speaker 2:They can go out and have fun without having to worry about like, is this safe? Mhmm. Is getting to this other location safe? Can I leave my house safely? Right.
Speaker 2:And I think that's something very cool Mhmm. Going on in the world.
Speaker 1:We were talking about this earlier, and we've talked about in a past episode something called bike face. Mhmm. And that was essentially back in in the early nineteen hundreds, I think.
Speaker 2:Maybe late eighteen hundreds.
Speaker 1:Bicycles really gained popularity in The United States. And women were riding them because women were not able to drive cars at the time. And so women were riding bikes and that gave them a level of freedom. It allowed them to do things like get jobs outside of the home because they had transportation to get there. It allowed them to have a social life outside of the home because they could get places.
Speaker 2:I think that's something we totally forget about is the community aspect. Having access to other people so so you can go talk to them and be like, hey, is this normal?
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Yeah. Well, we just talked about that on an episode. Having community allows you to to make sure that your life is healthy too. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And to check-in on other people.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Make sure your friends' lives are healthy.
Speaker 1:Right. Like, we're supposed to live in community.
Speaker 2:Not just
Speaker 1:as Christians, and of course, as Christians, we are supposed to, but also as humans, we are communal creatures.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Much as I am a deep, deep introvert, you need community.
Speaker 2:You need people. You think about, like, those shows like Life Life Below Zero
Speaker 1:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Where they're trying to live completely off the grid because they hate Straight up alone. Alone. Oh, yeah. The thing is, that's okay for a time. Right.
Speaker 2:But you can't do it all on your own. Mhmm. You need the doctors. Mhmm. You need the doctors.
Speaker 1:I mean, half the time you need the grocery store. You need, you know and just people. You need friends. You need voices. You need someone not to make you go insane.
Speaker 2:You needed an engineer to make your snowmobile.
Speaker 1:Obviously. That's the thing. You need people. Yeah. And this rideshare service, like, much as it might seem like a small thing, opens that up for these women.
Speaker 1:These women that would not necessarily feel safe getting into a car or wouldn't maybe find it proper because of their religious beliefs to get into a car with a man, with a singular man. They now have that option. Mhmm. And I wonder what that would do if we because I think a lot of I was thinking about dating apps because Brie's had some exciting dating app stories this week. But I was thinking about dating apps and how dating apps are so geared towards what functions well for men.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:It's so visual. You're first looking at pictures. Mhmm. You know, things like that. And what if instead of that apps and technology, thought about women first or even equally or at all or at all?
Speaker 1:Like, what does that do? Because you look at this seemingly small change, seemingly small shift for a company, but it has life changing implications for women. So what happens if we take the rest of our technology and ask, what about the women?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, it's an even a simple change that, like, Uber or Lyft could do on their app. Like, would you like a female driver? Mhmm. And you could just request that.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. That would be awesome. Mhmm. That would be thoughtful for women just living their day to day life. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:There's another app that I saw on TikTok that I think is an important app to know about just for anybody. I think it's literally for anybody, but it's called Noon Light. N o o n light. Thank you. You're welcome.
Speaker 2:And it's just a safety app. So, and it's free. I don't think there, I think there is a paid version that you can use, but it's just free. And it asks you to create a four digit pin. And once you enter that four digit PIN, then every time you open the app, it's just a button.
Speaker 2:And you hold down the button anytime you just don't feel safe. So if you're going on a jog or if you're going out to your car at night or you're in a building and some man keeps talking to you. Just any, literally any time you feel unsafe. You hold down the button until you feel that you're safe, and then you release the button, and then you type in your code, and that's it. But if you release the button and you don't enter your code, then it gives you kind of like a countdown.
Speaker 2:And I believe it starts recording the situation, and it contacts the police, and it pings your location. Mhmm. So that's just a good good little free app to have in your back pocket if you don't have, you know, mace and batteries on a chain.
Speaker 1:I mean, even if you do, unfortunately, the world that we live in, violence against women is so common. It's
Speaker 2:too common. I mean, and
Speaker 1:we're gonna hear about a story in just a second where violence against women is so common that we just don't even hear about it. Like, it's just a normal part of our day to day lives. And so it is important for us to share with our sisters out there in the world, hey, here's something to help keep you safe. Mhmm. Go forth and and don't get murdered.
Speaker 1:You know?
Speaker 2:It I was on like a weird side of TikTok for a while that was all like self defense.
Speaker 1:Obviously. We're really into self defense.
Speaker 2:I'm like, oh, I'm gonna be going places where I will need to take someone out. Seriously. But they were talking about like, hey, if you can't carry a traditional weapon on you, or if you're afraid of like because a lot of times, if you don't know how to use that weapon, it can be used against you. Right. As our father has definitely told us.
Speaker 2:But there was one girl that was like, I always carry around a long lanyard. And on that lanyard, I have 75 of the worst key chains that I can find. Just like, really, really. And it's heavy. And she will practice with it, just like swinging it around.
Speaker 2:Jeez. And so she's like, anytime I'm just like walking down the streets and I feel a little bit suspicious of someone, I'm swinging that thing around.
Speaker 1:That would be terrifying.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I will grant her that. And she knew it was like a num chug. That was insane.
Speaker 1:Well, it's hard because you don't know, like, your local laws and things like that. I know Mhmm. When I went to college, my parents gave me a can of mace, like, because I had nighttime Yeah. Mhmm. I had nighttime classes and I would walk across campus.
Speaker 1:And I would sit there with, like because I was we were raised with, like, very you have to be very aware and very cautious of your surroundings and things
Speaker 2:like Which is interesting because you are not very aware
Speaker 1:or I'm more aware than our mother. But I would walk across campus with this little thing of mace. But there are certain states where and certain countries, I'm sure, where that's either not accessible
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Or not legal. Yeah. And that's just one thing. I know that there are, like, many states where different things are illegal. Or you might not have the stomach to to spray someone with mace in the face, you know.
Speaker 1:So you yeah. It around a key chain.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Anybody can do that. Yeah. Go for the eyes. But, yes, violence against women is all too common.
Speaker 2:It's something that is so common that they don't even put it in the news half the time. But something that I did see was on ABC World News, and this just happened, so 06/24/2025. 14 suspects were arrested after 145 people, mostly women and girls, were jabbed by syringes at a nationwide music festival in France. Isn't that insane? Victims reported bruising and dizziness, but they don't know what was in the syringes yet.
Speaker 2:And that's just like so common you don't even hear about it.
Speaker 1:Well, you told me this story, and I was like, part of my job is to deal with the news all the time. Like, I deal with the news every day. And I read the news on my off time. I never heard a word about this.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And this is what frustrates me when people are like, ugh, why are you so worried about safety? Why do you think it's so hard to be a woman? Mhmm. Because things like this are happening Mhmm.
Speaker 2:To women all the time.
Speaker 1:But we get told that we're exaggerating problems. We get told that, like, well, that might be some women's experience, but that's not the the broad female experience. No.
Speaker 2:It is. A 145 people. Who just
Speaker 1:went to a music festival. Yeah. They didn't do anything you know, women get blamed a lot for the violence against them. And that's insane. And it's never ever the victim's fault.
Speaker 1:But you look at a situation like this, and I would love to know how you justify victim blame in this situation. These are just women going to a music festival. Just a music festival. We can't even do that and feel safe.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Just random acts of violence. Mhmm. No reason for it. Just violence.
Speaker 2:Yep. Because this is why we say this all the time. Like, people hate women. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Yeah. It's it's impossible to walk out of your front door and feel safe for many, many, many women. I would say probably for the majority of women. Mhmm. Because even we live in a a very safe area, relatively so, you know.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. I don't need to necessarily feel worried about violent crime happening around me all the time. And yet, even so, if it's dark outside, I don't like to walk to my car. My car is 10 feet from my door. But I don't like to walk to my car because it's dark and I don't know who's out there.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Because this is the experience of so many women because I see it in the news all the time. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Well, I would love to know a man's experience. Like, what must it be like to just literally even in the light of day, be able to walk in a parking lot to your car without just having to constantly be aware of your surroundings. Right. If you see a man in the grocery store in the same aisle as you, and you see him at another place in the grocery store, it's like, is he following me? Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Or with dating apps, you have to be so careful with that too. Like, there's risk there. When you go and meet someone for the first time on a date, for a man, often, and I think we've said this before, but for a man, often the risk is, oh, she might not like me. Or I might not be attracted to her. But for a woman going out of her state like that, like, the risk is, oh, I could die.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Yeah. And what's wild to me and we haven't necessarily talked about, like, Christian aspects within this. It's been mostly
Speaker 2:a feminist podcast today. Sometimes you need that.
Speaker 1:But I think, like, from a Christian standpoint, so often the western conservative Christian church is the first one to dismiss violence against women. Mhmm. They're the first ones to dismiss the experiences of women. And I look at Jesus and who Jesus was. And that he was the first one to look at women and say, your experiences are valid.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. You look at all of his interactions with women. Whether that was, you know, the woman at the well that he spoke with. And we did a whole episode on her. Whether it was Mary Magdalene or even the broader women of the bible like Deborah and Mhmm.
Speaker 1:JL and Phoebe. And female experiences were valid and important and listened to. Mhmm. And yet the church is the first one to dismiss Which
Speaker 2:when Paul says, go and be different. Mhmm. They were showing the people at that time how to be different. Because women were property Mhmm. At the time.
Speaker 2:They didn't have rights. And so Jesus speaking to them like they were people and not cattle, that is the difference. Mhmm. That he showed love. He showed equality towards men and women.
Speaker 2:And we're somehow slipping back into, like, the past right now, where women's opinions, their lives are not valid. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:I think if we were to look at the biblical times, you know, and kind of that society and culture, I think we're starting to look as a Christian community more like what the Roman culture was. That Paul and Jesus were specifically saying, don't do this. Step away from this. Be different. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And that's so much more what we look like. I've seen so many TikToks recently. I saw one today. And it said, if your church wouldn't welcome Jesus into it today, then you need to find a new church. And so he listed out.
Speaker 1:He's like, you know, you might sit here and tell me like, my gosh, my church of course, my church would welcome Jesus, you know, whatever. And so he's like, okay. Well, let's talk about that. Jesus was an immigrant. Jesus was a person with brown skin.
Speaker 1:Jesus fought for equality. Jesus hung out with the prostitutes and the tax collectors and let people wash his feet that most of society rejected. And he washed their feet. Exactly. He interacted with women.
Speaker 1:He gave women equality. He gave people of color equality. You know, like, all of these all of these things that the modern western evangelical church is rejecting.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And I see that in all of this where where the church would have a big problem with many of these things.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. But what I find is some, like, bright bright spots are there are churches out there that are saying, no. That's not okay. We're not going to be like that. And we actually follow several of those churches on TikTok.
Speaker 2:So feel free to look those up.
Speaker 1:Yeah. There's quite a few accounts that I've been following that are really inspirational that I really appreciate. They are
Speaker 2:very inspirational because of many things.
Speaker 1:Alright. So shall we to the next segment? Alright. So this post is from, oh gosh, a while ago. When did we post this?
Speaker 2:Gosh. It was a while ago.
Speaker 1:May. May. It's been a hot minute, I'm like, the other day.
Speaker 2:Oh, a month and a half ago.
Speaker 1:We're not, like, the most on
Speaker 2:top of things all the time.
Speaker 1:We have jobs. Okay. So it's a picture of Brie's really excited face. It's actually deeply terrifying. It says, tell us about your unhinged acts of microfeminism, and we'll share them on the pod.
Speaker 1:And if you guys wanna come and comment on this again, I'm sure that we will revisit this and chat about more things. But here's just a few of them. So one of them says calling all unknown animals she or her. I hate that the default is male. And then she named her Roomba Victor because he does the vacuuming, which
Speaker 2:I thought was hilarious. I've actually heard that just in general, like, anytime someone says, oh, I'll ask my boss or oh, ask the doctor, always assuming that person is a she. Mhmm. Be like, oh, what did she say? Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Because our default absolutely is male. And, yeah, to just change that narrative in your head is really impactful.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Or even something as simple as, like, his and hers Mhmm. Switching it. Hers and his. Hers and his.
Speaker 1:Missus and mister. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah. For sure. It sounds weird. It doesn't roll off the tongue. Because it's not how we're taught.
Speaker 2:It's not how we're taught. But I think it's just like a little switch in your brain. Right? To be able to be like, oh, no. Women can come first sometimes.
Speaker 2:Women can come first sometimes. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And then this one also says, I explained the proper use of sports analogies at the construction company that I own because I work in sports and the boys are using them incorrectly.
Speaker 2:I love that.
Speaker 1:I know. I thought that was there's many a thing to unpack in that post. But, yeah, it's so often assumed. Now, this doesn't apply to you and I because we know nothing about sports and we hate Oh, what
Speaker 2:are you talking about? I took frisbee in college.
Speaker 1:She did do that. And badminton. Uh-huh. I'm so sorry that I insulted you.
Speaker 2:Listen. I got a whole c minus
Speaker 1:in badminton. So outside of badminton and frisbee golf
Speaker 2:No. No. No. No. No.
Speaker 2:Ultimate frisbee. Oh, sorry. Sorry. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:Ultimate frisbee. Yes. I just needed to correct you there. Right. I was wrong.
Speaker 1:We know nothing about sports. That being said,
Speaker 2:many women do. Yeah. Heck yeah. Many women in our family specifically are obsessed with football. I don't understand it.
Speaker 2:I don't get it. They're just throwing balls around. And me and one of my aunts just like to look at the tight ends. Yeah. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:But Poor dad. But I don't know sports.
Speaker 1:But some women do. And just because you're
Speaker 2:a woman does not mean that you don't know anything about sports.
Speaker 1:But the amount of mansplaining when you're just even when a sporting event is on, good heavens. You don't even have to have asked a question. But they are ready to explain every little thing to you.
Speaker 2:I like to cause chaos. Maybe that's an act of microfeminism. Just general chaos. Like, for example, when pickleball is on. And I say, where are the gherkins?
Speaker 1:There are so many reasons this episode is gonna get flagged.
Speaker 2:I'm aware that pickleball doesn't have real pickles. But I like just to see people's faces. I like to cause chaos.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. Well, we've probably said this before, but on Black Friday, yeah, the day after Thanksgiving?
Speaker 2:What? That's Black Friday.
Speaker 1:Shut up. Last one, me and Brie and my daughter all wore shirts that said, go Taylor's boyfriend.
Speaker 2:And to be totally honest with you,
Speaker 1:I could not care less who won that game. I barely know any of their names. I just don't care in any way. But I think it's very funny because it frustrates people. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:But also, I love that concept of, like, we're gonna call him Taylor's boyfriend Mhmm. Instead of
Speaker 2:His name.
Speaker 1:Yeah. There's actually that that was a big thing, I would say, last year sometime, where there's an Olympic athlete and she's married to, I think, one of the football players on the Bears.
Speaker 2:Is it Simone Biles? No. No.
Speaker 1:He's on the Bears. And there was an article and it said, wife of whatever his name is, wins gold medal or something like that. And it was like a bunch of people commenting were like, her name is this. Because women are so often seen by their husband's names.
Speaker 2:They're identified by who they're married to. Well, it's like when you Their closest male connection.
Speaker 1:Right. When you get married and, like, the pastor
Speaker 2:will
Speaker 1:say, I now present to you mister and missus Nathan Parrish, for instance Mhmm. In my case. And it's like your whole identify identity disappears.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:You know? Like, I'm just part of him now, I guess. So, yeah. Like, an act of microfeminism. Just saying just switching it up.
Speaker 1:He's Taylor's boyfriend.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. I like it. I now pronounce you mister and missus Taylor's boyfriend? Taylor's boyfriend.
Speaker 1:Yep. That would be a great shirt. I'll get that one for next time.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:The next time I force myself to sit through a football game. Which won't be anytime soon.
Speaker 2:Nope. I don't think it's football season. Although, who am I to say? I don't think it is either.
Speaker 1:I'm pretty sure it ends with the Super Bowl, which I think
Speaker 2:is in February. But when does it begin?
Speaker 1:Don't August. No. That's high school football.
Speaker 2:What's the difference? I don't know.
Speaker 1:Are people out there that are horrified right now.
Speaker 2:Listen. If you wanna learn about football, there are plenty of women out there that are very qualified to teach you.
Speaker 1:I am not one of them. Me neither. So this week, just so that you can understand the amount of chaos in our lives, Let's peek behind the curtains at their lives. Brie is off work. Her office closes a few times a year, and so she's off work this week.
Speaker 1:And we thought, what should we do with Brie's time off? Now note, I don't have time off. My husband doesn't have time off, but Brie does.
Speaker 2:And I'm here for a good time. It's not a long time.
Speaker 1:We thought, what to do, what to do. Here's the thing. We have been, not we, Brianna. Brianna has been obsessed with Buc ee's, the gas station, for quite some time now. I've never been.
Speaker 1:She's never been. Because we live in Michigan and they don't have them here. And so what are we doing? Obviously, we're driving six hours to the close of Buckeys.
Speaker 2:If you wanna join us in Kentucky, that's where we'll be. That's where we'll be. Actually, literally, when this is coming out. Yeah. So that's that's what we'll be doing this week.
Speaker 2:Oh, casual shout out. Have you guys heard
Speaker 1:of that Ryan Trahan guy? Yes, because that's all we watch.
Speaker 2:He is on a mission to donate as much money as humanly possible to St. Jude's Children's Hospital. So if you guys wanna go and donate, he's going to all 50 states in fifty days and staying at a different Airbnb in every state. And I think that's absolutely hilarious. However, I really support St.
Speaker 2:Jude's Children's Hospital. And as of today, he's at, like, $2,400,000. Yeah. It's insane. That'll just tell you how much money is out there floating around in the world.
Speaker 2:In twenty days, he's gotten that.
Speaker 1:Thank you for that. So next week, I wanna talk a little bit about church safety. Oh. I think that would be a really good one for us to dig into. Like the crossing guards?
Speaker 1:No. No. Not quite that. So there's a book called Safe Church by doctor Andrew Baumann. And it's one that I've wanted to read for a while.
Speaker 1:I'm not sure that we will read it before next week. But I wanna talk a little bit about the lack of safety in churches for women. What we've seen, what other people are seeing, other people's experiences. Maybe we'll post on TikTok so you guys can let us know some of your experiences as well. Some TikToks?
Speaker 1:Yeah. Some TikToks. And ways that the church can improve. Like, where do we go from here? How do we make things feel safer?
Speaker 1:Because I don't know about you guys out there, but for me, as someone who has had a ton of church trauma, has had a lot of lack of safety in church, it's hard to walk into a church at all. Because you walk in automatically assuming this is yeah. This is not a safe place for me. So what can churches do to make women feel comfortable and safe?
Speaker 2:And actually, I think that's good timing because the author of that book is gonna be at Baker Book House on July 8, I believe, in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Speaker 1:With professor Beach, who we spoke with last week. So you can see both of them. And I believe there's another author there as well. So you guys can head out there if you're local to Michigan. That would be an amazing event.
Speaker 1:Plus Or Baker Book House is amazing.
Speaker 2:It's amazing. But also, like, say you're unhinged. Like Alyssa and I, and you're just like, no. I'm absolutely gonna go on a road trip to that.
Speaker 1:I mean, I would, except I'm getting my wisdom teeth pulled that day.
Speaker 2:So We could make some fun tic tacs with that. Oh, the tic tacs. Alright. So we'll see
Speaker 1:you guys next week to talk a little bit about church safety. In the meantime, be nicer humans and go donate some of your billions of
Speaker 2:dollars, obviously. Billions and billions.
Speaker 1:Billions and billions. We know you're out there.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Alright. See you next week. Love you. Bye.
Speaker 2:May the lord bless and keep you.